How important is a great engine?

why not , reliable as hell and get 40 mpg. sounds great to me
Friend of mine in college had one. He said he could get it up to 60mph... if he tried hard enough. I think most of the time 50-55 was about it, and I never heard him talk about hills...
 
Friend of mine in college had one. He said he could get it up to 60mph... if he tried hard enough. I think most of the time 50-55 was about it, and I never heard him talk about hills...
that is such a wives tale. i own 3 , 2 jettas and one golf(1980,1983,1979). all of which are capable of 130kph and cruise at 110 all day. hills yes they don't do very well unless its got a turbo which one of mine does and you drive it like a normal car
 
It's not terribly important to have a great engine, but it's not good to be on the other end of the scale, as witnessed by the donut media current hi-lo cars...

 
that is such a wives tale. i own 3 , 2 jettas and one golf(1980,1983,1979). all of which are capable of 130kph and cruise at 110 all day. hills yes they don't do very well unless its got a turbo which one of mine does and you drive it like a normal car
He was my roommate, pursuing an engineering degree, and as serious as the day was long.

I got to drive it once. He wasn't kidding. His was the 1.6L/4MT. Not sure on age but I'm guessing 12-15 years old and past 200k on the clock; it may well have been tired.
 
Mine was a 1986 Jetta 5-speed and it could drive at 70 without much issue. I commuted on the freeway with it regularly for a few years. I think the odometer quit around 220k miles.

It was slow to accelerate and you could feel a lot of drag with the A/C on... but I did have A/C! You had to rev it a lot to get maximum power out of it. The A/C and power steering lines made it harder to work on that you would expect for a car of that era.

It was a coarse engine and pretty loud inside, that could be because the car was not much over 2000 lbs. Was very hard to start when the temps got close to zero F. Mine had a lot of oil leaks and tended to vibrate so much that it would lose bolts. The injection pump was a rebuilt one, but it still developed a leak while I owned it (I resealed it myself and saved a bundle).
 
Going by feel the Ford 300 6 and the 2006 toyota Tacoma 4 cyl engine are 2 of my favorites. Most Twisted crank v8s feel good. The Big Cam Cummins were nice engined way back when I drove semi trucks but a Detroit 6V92 and a 13 speed Road Ranger transmission was fun to drive from the San Francisco Bay area to Portland Oregon running through the mountains. I do not care for boxer engine feel though.
 
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